פירוש על קהלת 12:5

Also when they will fear heights. From the mounds and bumps in the streets; [i.e.,] he is afraid to go outdoors because he might stumble on them.⁸Alternatively, they fear heights because they feel that they do not have the energy to climb them. (Ibn Ezra)

“They will also fear heights, there will be obstacles on the way, the almond tree will blossom, the grasshopper will be burdened, the caper berry will fail. For the man goes to his eternal home, and the mourners will circle in the streets” (Ecclesiastes 12:5).
“They will also fear heights” – An elderly man, when they would call him to a place , he says to them: ‘Are there thorns there? Are there ascents there? Are there descents there?⁴He does not want to attend if traveling will be difficult, for example if there are thorns or he will have to go uphill or downhill. “There will be obstacles [ḥatḥatim] on the way” – Rabbi Abba bar Kahana and Rabbi Levi: One said: The fear [ḥititei] of the way descends upon him, [so that he says:] Shall I go or shall I not go; and he [eventually] says: I shall not go. The other said: He begins delineating subdivisions along the route. He says: Until this street, until this place, I am able to go, but until that place I am unable to go.
“The almond tree will blossom” – Rabbi Levi said: This is the nut-sized bone at the top of the spinal column. Hadrian, may his bones be crushed and his name expunged, asked Rabbi Yehoshua ben Ḥananya; he said to him: ‘From where does a person blossom in the future?’⁵When a person comes back to life at the resurrection of the dead. He said to him: ‘From the nut-sized bone at the top of the spinal column.’ [Hadrian] said to him: ‘Show me.’ What did [Rabbi Yehoshua] do? He brought him the nut-sized bone at the top of the spinal column. He placed it in water, but it did not dissolve; in fire, but it did not burn; in a mill, but it was not ground. He placed in on an anvil and struck it with a hammer. The anvil split, the hammer split, but it was to no avail.
“The grasshopper will be burdened” – these are one’s ankles. “The caper berry will fail” – this is the desire that sustains peace between a man and his wife;⁶The desire for marital relations. it will cease. Rabbi Shimon ben Ḥalafta was accustomed to ascending to our Rabbi.⁷He would go to see Rabbi Yehuda HaNasi on a monthly basis. When he grew old, he was unable to do so. One time, he ascended. Our Rabbi said to him: ‘Why have we been privileged to see the radiant countenance of the rabbi today?’ He said to him: ‘The distant have become close, the close have become distant, two have become three, and what sustains peace has ceased.’
“For the man goes to his eternal home” – it is not written here, “to the eternal home,” but rather, “his eternal home.” Reish Lakish said: [This is analogous] to a king who entered a province, accompanied by dukes, governors, and military commanders. Although all of them enter through one gate, each and every one stays in a place corresponding to his status. So too, although all taste the taste of death, each and every one has a world in and of himself. “And the mourners will circle in the streets” – these are the worms.

And terrors on the road. The road’s many fears and terrors.